There are two sitting positions for holding
the guitar; classical and casual.

1. Pick up the guitar and make sure that
the guitar body is supported by your leg.
2. Position yourself at the edge of your chair.
3. Ensure that your back is relaxed but straight.
4. Lean the guitar back towards you slightly.

Standing Position

1. Pick up the guitar and place the
strap over your shoulder. Adjust the strap so that the guitar is
positioned mid-body.
2. Use your left hand to support the neck of the guitar.
3. Rest your right hand over the bridge of the guitar.

Hand Positions

It is important that you relax your
wrists and hands. Straining them can cause injury.

Front View

Rear View

Warning!
Make sure that you never position your hand like this:

Your thumb should
never be placed this low on the neck of the guitar as it puts
unneccessary strain on your wrist and thumb.

Fretting

When you play the guitar, you use your
left hand fingers to press down the strings on the fret board of the
guitar and use your right hand to pluck or strum the stings at the bridge
end of the guitar. Using your left hand to press the strings on the fret
board is called fretting. Here are some tips you will need to know:

1. Short fingernails are essential.
2. Use only the tips of your fingers to press the strings.
3. When making a chord, be sure that each fingertip is placed directly
behind the fret.
We will cover chords in lesson one.
4. Check each string that it rings clearly and is not muted or buzzing.

As a beginner guitarist, it may hurt
your fingers to play. This is normal. Every guitarist starts this way for
the first couple of weeks. With practice, you will develop guitar fingers
(hard skin on your fingertips).

Holding the Pick

Position the pick between thumb and
index fingers like in the diagram below:

Time to take a break. Well done, you've
just completed the first part of this newsletter. Next you are about to
learn about chords and by the end of this lesson you'll have learnt the A
Major chord.

Now you are ready to start your first
lesson. Your aim in this lesson is to learn the A and D major chords and
to introduce yourself to reading guitar tablature. This lesson is very
important, so I want you to really focus.

Remember! It is more
beneficial for you to practice multiple times during a week than to
practice for one long session. This is because your brain processes
information in chunks at a time and it can only hold a certain amount in
short term storage.

For example, with phone numbers, it is
very difficult to remember any more than 7 digits at a time. Yet if you
give yourself time between practicing, even if it is just 10 minutes,
you’ll find that your brain is much more efficient at turning your short
term practice into long term knowledge. More information on effective
learning is contained in our Jamorama product at Jamorama.com.

Ok. That aside, let’s get started on the
lesson. To start with, I want you to have a look at the guitar neck
diagram below and make note of all the relevant pieces of information.

Frets
The guitar neck is divided into what we call frets, making a fret
board. Most guitars have around 20 frets. In this first book, we will
focus on the first four, also known as the first position. In book 2,
we will move beyond that. Notice that we number each fret starting at
1 at the head of the guitar.

Note: Each string on
the guitar is numbered. When you hold your guitar as you would when using
the casual playing position, the 1st string is at the bottom and the 6th
string is at the top.

Notice also the term, ‘Tuning’ at the
bottom of the above diagram. Tuning refers to the notes that the guitar
strings are tuned to. In the above diagram, I have given a very common
tuning called standard E tuning that consists of the notes E, A, D, G and
B. Strings 1 and 6 are both tuned to the note E. The open 6th string is
called low E. The open 1st string is called high E as it is two octaves
higher than the 6th string open E. I will explain notes and octaves to you
in a later newsletter, but for now, you only need to know the names of the
notes in standard open E tuning.

Now make sure that your
guitar is tuned to open E tuning (the most common
tuning). If you don't know how to tune your guitar, then download my
free guide to tuning your guitar from:
http://www.jamorama.com/tuning/tuning.pdf.
Or if you are already a member of
Jamorama.com, you can use our guitar
tuning software to help you tune your guitar.

We will stick to standard E tuning
throughout this newsletter, but you can find other tunings to play
with in our member’s area at
www.jamorama.com.

Introduction to Chords

Now we are going to look at guitar
chords. Guitarists use many different chords to make progressions or riffs
that can then be used to create songs. If you are not familiar with some
of these terms, it’s ok. We will cover everything that I am talking about
in good time.

A chord is defined as a combination of 3
or more notes played together. To examine this, I want to take a look at
chord diagrams. Chord diagrams are used to illustrate how a chord is
played. They are very easy to use because they look very much like the
neck of the guitar, in fact, the Jamorama chord diagram is a guitar neck.

As stated above the Jamorama chord
diagrams are going to be pictures of an ‘actual’ guitar neck so it’s easy
to make the connection between strings and fingering. There is also a
picture of the type of chord diagram that appears in most other Guitar
learning guides. I want you to be aware of that form of ‘standard’ chord
diagram because you may want to use it when writing up chords on paper at
home.

So, now that you know what a chord
diagram looks like and how it matches with the neck of your guitar, it’s
time to come back to what I said earlier about a chord being a combination
of 3 or more notes played together. Finger placing symbols are added to
the chord diagram so we know which notes to play. To start with, let’s
look at your fingers.

We give each playing
finger a number that we can then match up on the chord diagram (see
below).

And now, let’s look at a full chord
diagram. We will use the example of the A major chord:

Chord Diagram - A Major Chord
In the chord diagram below you can see that the A major chord uses fingers
1, 2, and 3. Take note of how this chord diagram looks - we will use this
style from now on.

The A major chord is
constructed of the notes A, C# and E. We will cover notes a little
later. For now, we will make chords without knowledge of individual
notes.

Note that there is a red dot marking the
6th string on the above chord diagram. The red dot tells you that you are
not to play that string. The sixth string of the A major chord is not
played, but you play the rest.

Throughout this newsletter series, every
chord diagram will be accompanied by a picture of the chord being held on
the fret board and video and audio of the chord being played for you to
check with. Pictured below is the A major chord being played.

Exercise: Playing the A Major
Chord
Position each finger with care, according to the above diagram. Make sure
that each fingertip is placed directly behind the fret. Firstly, pluck
across the strings one by one with your right hand, checking that each
string rings clearly and is not muted or buzzing. Play the first Audio or
video example to hear how the chord should sound.

Now that we’ve looked at chord diagrams,
I want to move on to strumming.

Introduction to Strumming
In a strum there are two types of guitar stroke. They are up stroke and
down stroke. Throughout this book these strokes will be notated as
follows:

When you play a stroke, you strum across
the strings just in front of the bridge of the guitar with the pick in
your left hand. When strumming a chord, make sure that you play all of the
necessary strings in the chord. The stroke direction will depend on which
stroke is indicated; up or down as shown above.

Exercise: Strumming the A Major
Chord
Position each finger with care, according to the A Major chord diagram
(above). Make sure that each fingertip is placed directly behind the fret.
Firstly, pluck across the strings one by one with your right hand,
checking that each string rings clearly and is not muted or buzzing. Once
you are sure that you are holding the A major chord correctly, practice
strumming the chord in single downward strokes as indicated below:

While you play this, see if you can say
out loud an even 4 count. Another option if you are a Jamorama.com member
is to use the jamorama metronome - it will help you to stay in time.

Tip: You can download a
video or audio example of the above exercise to see and hear it for
yourself. The download links are below (right click on the link and select
"save as"):

Try your best to start your strum from
the fifth string each time you strum. A major, doesn’t sound bad if you
accidentally hit the top string, although if you want your music to sound
professional, you’ll want to play this chord properly. Remember to stay
relaxed. Your fingers may hurt a little but they will get stronger.

Now that you are playing the A major
chord properly, let’s take a look at strumming another chord...

The D Major Chord
The D Major Chord is constructed of the notes D, F# (F sharp) and A and is
played using fingers 1, 2 and 3:

As with the A major chord: try strumming
the D major chord in downward strokes with your right hand.

Tip: You can download a
video or audio example of the above exercise to see and hear it for
yourself. The download links are below (right click on the link and select
"save as"):

Note:
The top two, or fifth and sixth, strings are not played in the D major
chord. Make sure that you start your stroke from the third string each
time you strum D major, it doesn’t sound bad if you accidentally hit the
fifth string, although as with A major above, if you want your music to
sound professional, you need to play this chord properly.

Hints for Buying a New
Guitar Whether
you’re buying your first guitar, upgrading or simply adding to your
collection, your first priority is to do your homework. There are many
different resources available and you should endeavour to use them
all. Guitar magazines are a good place to find out prices and
specifications on different models of guitar. You can get similar
knowledge from browsing at your local instrument shop. Another great
tool is the internet – you can check for the most competitive prices,
get some information on the manufacturers and search for other
guitarist’s reviews and opinions.

You
really need to arm yourself well before you try haggling with your
local guitar salesman.

Often you can find
online auctions where guitars sell for incredibly low prices; however,
I wouldn’t advise you to take this option. As a rule you should always
play before you buy so that you get a chance to gauge performance.

Once you’ve got the
background knowledge that you need on the guitar of your choice the
next task is to set yourself a budget and stick to it. Don’t let
salespeople talk you into spending more money than you anticipated.

Testing out new guitars
in the shop can be an intimidating task for beginners. It is important
to remember that you are not there to showcase your playing ability –
you are there to discern whether your proposed buy is a good deal or
not. Check the frets for buzzing by playing each one. Make sure that
the neck is not warped by looking down it as if you were sighting a
gun. Check that all of the volume and tone switches etc. are in good
working condition.

It is a great idea to
take an experienced guitarist along with you when you are looking at a
possible purchase, so see if you can persuade a teacher of friend. Not
only will they be able to offer helpful advice – they will be good
moral support when it’s time to pick up the guitar and test it out in
public.